Marathon Runner Harvey A Master at Any Distance

After qualifying for five Olympic trials in distances from 800 meters to the marathon, Alisa Harvey, 43, enters tomorrow's Marine Corps Marathon not quite a contender but hardly just another runner.

It's not that she won't be competitive, although Harvey concedes that her fastest days are behind her. Even if Harvey meets her goal time of 3 hours 5 minutes, she will do well to finish among the top 10. The last time she ran Marine Corps, in 2005, Harvey went out fast and struggled home in 3:10:07, still good enough to win the masters (over 40) division. "I forgot it was actually a 26-mile race," the track specialist joked. "In my old age, I'm much more logical, smarter. This time, I want to get it right."

Harvey began racing 26 years ago, sprinting 100 and 200 yards as a teenager. She found a niche in middle distances at Thomas Jefferson High School in Alexandria and competed collegiately at the University of Tennessee, where she was an NCAA champion at 1,500 meters. After college, Harvey competed on a variety of national teams and won a gold medal at 1,500 meters and silver at 800 at the 1991 Pan Am Games in Havana.

While most of her track contemporaries ultimately surrendered to age, injuries or vagaries of life, Harvey maintained razor-sharp fitness in her quadrennial attempts to make an Olympic team. "Those experiences were always bittersweet," she said. "I came so close to making the team but always just missed."

While Harvey, who now lives in Manassas, never lost her desire for the buzz that track competition provided, in her thirties she largely transferred that passion to road racing. In 1999, she ran 2:49:28 to finish second in the Richmond Marathon and qualify for the Olympic trials in a new event.

And when she turned 40, the world of masters track racing opened. On the track, she recorded times nearly equal those of the phenom she was in the mid-1980s, bringing her career full circle. Harvey set U.S. masters records, indoors and out, at 800 meters, 1,500 meters and the mile, including a world record of 4:47.26 for the indoor mile.

With those accomplishments in the books and her racing results facing an inevitable decline, the lifelong track rat faced a looming "What's next?"

"My own parents ask me that," Harvey said. "My ultimate goal is to keep being happy. I want to stay fit and have fun with it. I hope, in the process, I can encourage men, women, kids, too, to get out and give running a try."

Those seeds took root at home, where Harvey can count as a convert her older daughter, Virginia, who used to play soccer. After a 200-meter faceoff between mother and daughter, in which the 13-year-old ran 27 seconds to beat her mom, Virginia now runs varsity cross-country as a freshman at Battlefield High in Haymarket. Recently, Virginia confided to her mother, with a caveat, "not to get a big head, but there's a guy on the team who says you're his idol."

So Harvey's reputation has preceded her, and it's not just among kids. Working out at the track one afternoon, Harvey noticed the easy form of 34-year-old Carrie Conley, a former collegiate runner who had eased into fitness running. Harvey offered Conley a few pointers, asked her to join some workouts and eventually recruited her to run on Harvey's team in the Army Ten-Miler, where Conley finished 32nd in a personal best 65:37.

"I never would have been able to even dream of running like I did without Alisa's advice," said Conley, who is running the Philadelphia Marathon next month. "She just loves the sport of running. It's clear through her encouragement and by how hard she works."

"There are too many people who give it up too soon," said Harvey, who coached track at George Mason for three years and recently began her own coaching business. "Running is the perfect fit for a lot of regular, everyday people. And the marathon is the perfect goal, because it requires so much thought and preparation.

"I always wanted to find someone like me to coach me, because I've been there and I always give honest answers about training and racing -- that's what runners need but don't often get."

Her road racing peers agree. Susannah Kvasnicka, who began racing at 30 and won the 2005 Marine Corps Marathon three years later, sees a role model in Harvey.

"Some people might assume that I don't have a lot of time left to be competitive," Kvasnicka said. "But Alisa has shown that it's possible to stay strong and fast into your forties. I'll be 40 at the next Olympic trials, and I fully intend to be there. She's shown that it's possible."